Miss Merry Christmas Pageant

I recently attended the Miss Merry Christmas Pageant at the historical San Augustine Theater on the square sponsored by the Chamber of Commerce. The director, TC, asked me to be the auditor and asked Jeff to be another watchful eye at the back door. My thoughts were that I could watch and get a feel for pageantry and maybe look at some possible picture taking for future reference and do some community service with my husband. The competition began and the judges passed their sheets to me after each contestant finished their walk and every few minutes, more sheets were passed my way. I put the scores down across rows and columns, adding and double-checking my figures as the pageant continued. When all the contestants were finished, I still had work to do. I stopped and realized that I had missed just about every contestant walking through and barely heard any comments or watched any picture taking until after all was done. I was the auditor! What an awesome, important, and busy job. I learned so much from this experience. So much work and thought goes into an event like this from the contestants, sponsors, parents, organizers, and volunteers. It is not just a fun event for everyone in attendance; there are lessons to learn from joys to disappointments, to overcoming faults, and working towards a worthy goal, being true and committed. Also, who knows who will win and what the numbers will say about a contestant. The numbers decided the winner. Each little thing a contestant does can be seen in different ways by different people. The dress, the poise, the confidence, the knowledge, the service, the age, the beauty, the smile (really important) -- so many things are being considered for a winner. I think everyone would agree that they are all winners for having what it takes to get to this point. I did hear the reigning queen explain in her outgoing speech that when she won, she suddenly realized she was a role model and so she started acting like a role model. As she graciously set the crown on the head of the next Merry Christmas Queen, her confidence and inner beauty shown brightly for all the other contestants to see. She would get to keep her tiara and continue to be a beauty queen and role model the rest of her life.